German Chocolate Pie Recipe 

This post originally written November 2, 2007.

Growing up, my Memaw always made two pies for the holidays: Pecan Pie and some kind of chocolate pie with nuts and coconut blended together.  The chocolate pie was my favorite!  When she passed away in 1998, she took the recipe with her.  No one in our family had the recipe or knew what it was called.  In fact, for several holidays following her passing,  when I brought up the chocolate pie, not one close relative remembered the pie at all.  They only recalled her notorious pecan pie.  Well anyhoo!  I  haven't eaten Memaw's chocolate pie in 10 years and that's just not right.

When I think back real hard, it seems she had the pie baked before I could watch her make it.  Of course, I never had the sense to watch how she made everything.  I can only remember watching it cool on a rickety card table decorated with a festive tablecloth.  I remember the deep chocolate flavor, the chopped pecan and shredded coconut suspended in it's thick pudding texture.  I remember the flaky pie crust.  Yummmm...

I've come across this recipe that sounds like it could be it.  I'm going to bake it, taste it, photograph it and let you know if it's the one.

HERE'S WHAT I  NEED TO DO

• 4 ounces semisweet baking chocolate
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup butter
• 12-ounce can evaporated milk
• 3 egg yolks, slightly beaten
• 2/3 cup flaked coconut
• 1/3 cup chopped pecans
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 unbaked pie crust

Preheat oven to 350ºF degrees.
Combine chocolate, sugar, butter, and milk in a medium saucepan; cook over medium heat, stirring often, until mixture just comes to a boil. Remove from heat.  Temper the egg yolks.  Then stirring constantly, pour egg yolks back into the pan.

Add coconut, walnuts, and vanilla; stir. Pour into pie crust.  Be sure to make a foil pie ring to protect the pie crust from burning. Bake 50 min.-1 hour. Make 2-days ahead of serving.

3 DAYS LATER...

Well, this recipe and my memory match up!  Memaw's pie was thick in texture; thick like a pudding.  The deep chocolate flavor, the ratio of pecans and coconut I got spot on!

This pie gets better with time.  It becomes thicker and deeper with flavor on the second and third day.  Which totally explains why I never saw my grandmother make this pie.  She always had it made it before I was out on school holiday and then she must have hid it from the rest of us until the big day.

So definitely
Make this pie TWO DAYS AHEAD of SERVING for MAXIMUM FLAVOR & a THICK TEXTURE.